On the floor, on the furniture, on the walls, and all around the dead bodies scattered over the perimeter, the men’s insides practically hanging out.
Some of them have their heads cut off, and I hold back my gagging reflex, too mesmerized by John and his men, all tied up, sitting right in the middle. The wounds on their bodies are oozing blood while the doctor is lying on the operating table, a silver sword piercing his stomach as he struggles for breath and cries out in pain.
“Please,” John begs, and his tortured voice brings joy all over my system. His arms lie at a weird angle, so they must be broken. “Please kill me,” he begs the man standing above him, and that’s when I finally study him.
An angel of death himself, I think.
He’s wearing a black turtleneck sweater, black jeans, and boots, with his dark hair falling slightly below his ears.
His mouth curves in a smile at this, and he flips the knife dripping blood through his glove-covered fingers and clicks his tongue. “Ah, no. Death would be too easy for the likes of you.” He kicks Dylan, who breathes through his broken nose. “I killed all your staff, which amounts to what? Around fifty to sixty men? They participated in all this shit willingly, but you…” He places the knife under John’s chin, tilting it up so he couldn’t look away from him. “You and these four created this fucked-up ring, and you have to suffer for years, and even that won’t be enough to atone for your sins.”
“Who are you? We can pay you—” Whatever he wants to suggest ends in an agonizing scream when the man stabs the knife into his cheek, dragging the blade across it and creating a scar that will never heal.
I should know, I have enough on my back to attest to the fact.
“I’ll let them all deal with you. You think you’re suffering now? You haven’t seen anything yet.”
I shift a little in the cage, and that gets his attention as he turns to me and zeroes his emerald-green eyes in on me.
He cocks his head to the side and slowly walks up to me while I just gape at him, because no matter who this man is…he just saved me from death.
He crouches down in front of the cage, and asks, “What’s your name, little one?” I stay silent. “All the kids are in a different room. Had I known you were here, I would haveasked you to close your eyes.” I shake my head, because what? I so wish I had seen him doing all the bad things to them. Their suffering is my right! “Hang in there. They’ll be here in about ten minutes and help you. All this—” He swirls his finger in the air. “—is over. You’ll finally be free.” He gets up. “Oh, and if you can? Tell Lachlan that Rush said hi.” He leaves as swiftly as he came while the man who tortured me for the past two years struggles to breathe and moans in pain.
* * *
And true to his word, the powerful men come in exactly ten minutes.
They take the bad men away, free the children, and put them in some special cars, and promise to help me while trying to get me out of the cage, but I refuse.
I don’t trust them and expect them to hurt me. Instead, though, they accept my wish and keep me in the cage as they get me outside. All these men who used to hit me, withhold food from me, or keep me in a tight grip while the clients touched or beat me up lay on the grass with birds pecking at their dead flesh.
For the first time, my heart stirs with happiness so strong I barely resist the urge to laugh.
What a beautiful sight it is to watch all these dead bodies.
They put the cage in the van, taking me somewhere far away, and in this moment, I couldn’t care less because I survived.
Thank you, Thor,I whisper to the van’s ceiling.
All the while I think about the dark-haired man named Rush who came to the rescue.
What is it like to be…just like him?
Have all the skills, strength, and power to kill all these men?
And is there a way to make them suffer more…to prolong the torture…prolong the begging and cries?
* * *
They bring me to a fancy mansion and leave me in a huge room with sunlight, offering me water and food.
I refuse it.
They talk to me, reassure me they can help, and call in the nurse, which only increases my panic, because no!
Nurses and doctors usually looked me over to either give me painkillers or prepare me for the sick perverts.
Everything hurts, and I bite on my lip some more, resisting the urge to ask questions or ask for help, even if they seem better than John.
